The present invention relates generally to peripheral equipment for use with a notebook personal computer (“notebook PC”) or portable terminal, a portable electronic apparatus, a personal digital assistant (“PDA”), and other electronic apparatuses, and more particularly to an image pickup device connectible with the electronic apparatus or hardware. The “peripheral equipment”, as used herein, is such hardware as is connectible with a PC body and realizes necessary functions.
The recent development and spread of notebook PCs, portable terminals and portable electronic apparatuses have increasingly demanded compact and lightweight notebook PCs for portability purposes which nevertheless exhibit such affluent functions on a desk in an office as desktop personal computers (“desktop PCs”). As part of an attempt to achieve such multi-functionality, a device for adding an image pickup function to the notebook PC has been proposed.
Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 9-128091 discloses a notebook computer that has an image pickup device connectible to a PC card with a cable. However, an image pickup portion including an image-pickup lens is still too large for portability. Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 10-271376 has proposed a CCD camera built-in notebook PC that has improved the portability by mounting the entire CCD camera onto the PC card. Japanese Patent Applications Laid-Open Nos. 8-9215 (or U.S. Pat. No. 5,867,218) and 7-322117 (or European Patent Application, Publication No. 683,596) also disclose techniques of building a CCD camera in a card-shaped housing.
Japanese Utility-Model Registration No. 3011657 discloses an electronic camera that may be detachably stored in a concave portion provided on a desktop PC body and connected via a connector with the PC body in the concave portion.
A technique of mounting a CCD camera in a hinge portion connecting a liquid display bezel frame and base section of the notebook PC is known in the art as seen in products such as Toshiba's Libretto ff 1100, Panasonic's Let's note/C33EA, Sony's VAIO PCCGC1s.
Attachment techniques of a CCD camera or other USB-compatible units through a USB port instead of a PC card are known in the art as well. For example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 11-53060 discloses a notebook PC equipped with a CCD-camera USB port at a top of its display section so that the camera is connectible directly or via cable to the USB port. The USB port is compatible with a printer or keyboard in addition to the CCD camera. As recently as Jun. 21, 1999, Victor Company of Japan, Limited announced a release of a CCD camera (USB capture camera ‘MP-UC1’) that can be mounted on a notebook PC (mobile PC ‘InterLink’ MP-C101).
The present inventors have focused attention on a USB-compatible image pickup device having several advantages including plug-and-play and hot plug capabilities. The CCD camera as seen in Victor's MP-UC1 may be likely to be broken by concentrated load of its own weight on a connector portion with the notebook PC when the notebook PC with the CCD camera is lifted. In this respect, conventional configurations for the CCD camera are not sufficient so as to prevent the connector portion such as a USB port from breaking while ensuring its connectivity with universal notebook PCs.